Congress seeks Kerala CPI-M leader’s ouster from politburo

Thiruvananthapuram, Feb 7 (IANS) With the legal noose tightening around Kerala CPI-M secretary and politburo member Kodiyeri Balakrishnan’s elder son in an alleged financial fraud committed by him in the UAE, the Congress on Wednesday demanded that Balakrishnan be ousted from the politburo.

Senior Congress leader and member of the high power committee of the party in Kerala, Benny Behanan shot off a letter to CPI-M general secretary Sitaram Yechury demanding Balakrishnan’s ouster.

“Now that every day new reports about alleged financial fraud against Kodiyeri’s elder son Binoy Balakrishnan is coming out, it has come to light that Kodiyeri was aware of what was happening and he was protecting his son.

“This issue has surfaced in the assembly and has been taken up by the opposition also. So, in order to keep morality in public life and the way Kodiyeri was covering his son’s dubious deals and told lies, he should be removed from the politburo of the party,” said Behanan.

Problems began last month for Binoy and for Kodiyeri when a three-page letter dated January 5 from H.I.A. Al Marzooqi, sponsor of a Dubai-based company, was made available last month to the media, stating that he had started legal proceedings against Binoy for alleged fraud of Rs 13 crore.

When this first surfaced, both Kodiyeri and the party dismissed all this as nothing but false news and that there was no travel ban on his son and he is in Dubai.

The party washed its hands off the issue by stating that it was just a business deal between two businessmen and it had no role in it.

But things changed fast after it emerged that Binoy, who is in the UAE, has been barred from travelling out of the emirates after Marzooqi filed a petition against him as he had to get money from Binoy.

The news of the travel ban was given by Binoy’s younger brother Bineesh Kodiyeri.

Now, the latest reports from the UAE suggest that it would take a while before he is able to get the travel ban lifted as Marzooqi is determined that Binoy be taught a lesson for his deeds, which had caused huge embarrassment to him when he was in India last month trying to recover his money.

A press meet called by his counsel could not take place, after a lower court stopped it from being held.

However, the Kerala High Court on Tuesday stayed the lower court’s directive.

The case is currently being heard in a UAE court and it will take a few days for the first verdict to come out. Only after it comes, can Binoy go ahead and file an appeal and for that he will have to go through tough procedures.